Can reasoned mass testing impact covid-19 outcomes in wide community contexts? An evidence-based opinion

ABSTRACT

We describe the early phases of a COVID-19 epidemic in two contiguous Italian regions, Lombardy and Veneto, which were heavily and simultaneously hit by SARS-CoV-2 in Italy but showed markedly different disease outcome in terms of case fatality rate, SARS-CoV-2-attributable mortality and hospitalization. We discuss data limitations together with similarities and differences of the regional context possibly affecting COVID-19 control in the two regions. We conclude that the better COVID-19 outcome in Veneto was due, at least in part, to the adoption of a strategy of active search of asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infections (Reasoned Mass Testing), instead of a strategy strictly based on the detection of symptomatic cases.

KEYWORDS:

• SARS-CoV-2 Mass testing
• covid-19
• lombardy
• veneto
• mortality
• case Fatality Rate

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Antonella Torosantucci for drawing Figure 1, and Christo Hall for proofreading.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.